


An Act of Contrition

by Kaz_of_Carinthia



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-04-28
Updated: 2012-04-28
Packaged: 2017-11-04 12:09:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,164
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/393685
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kaz_of_Carinthia/pseuds/Kaz_of_Carinthia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Coming back was never going to be easy. But does it have to be impossibly difficult? (Sherlock's POV)</p>
            </blockquote>





	An Act of Contrition

**Author's Note:**

> Post-Reichenbach. Implies some knowledge of Season 2.
> 
> Inspired by legions of tremendously talented fanfic writers on Ao3 and elsewhere, as well as an irrational but enduring love of these characters.
> 
> Not beta-ed.

The light bulb explodes with a sharp “pop”, plunging the room into darkness.

 

3 – 2 – 1.

 

“Boys!”

 

So predictable.

 

“You’ve blown another fuse.”

 

She doesn’t sound cross. She hasn’t. Not about anything. Not since I almost frightened her to death, stepping into her kitchen and calmly requesting an ice pack. Nose and teeth had remained untouched, but the power and precision of John’s punch had carved a wound along my cheekbone, adding a scarlet crescent to the throbbing, tender bruise purpling below.

 

Now she appears at the door to the living room, and her fingertips tap a soft tattoo on the wooden frame, both a request for permission to enter and a signal of an intention already in execution. Her kind, open face is adorned by a ridiculous contraption, some kind of headlamp.

 

I exchange an amused glance with John as she turns the beam of the lamp towards the kitchen drawer where the spare fuses are kept.  We used to do this all the time. Not any more. Now I greedily record and store each instance of the old camaraderie. After the shock of my sudden appearance, John’s face became unreadable to me, shuttered. The regret that initially flooded his features whenever he glanced at my bruised face gradually yielded to careful indifference – a schooled, unnatural blankness that sits uncomfortably on John’s kind face.

 

How she had fussed, that day. John made her a restorative cup of tea, accompanied by the requisite sounds designed to calm and reassure. Dabbing at her tear-streaked cheeks with a dainty, lace-trimmed handkerchief, she turned her relieved and only mildly reproachful gaze upon my diminished frame. I read every stage of her plan to feed me, nurse me, heal me, in her concerned but fondly determined face, and I decided, right there and then, that my act of contrition toward Mrs. Hudson would be my total, uncomplaining and patient submission.

 

John, however. Now, John presents a challenge of an entirely different dimension. The warmth in his eyes, in his voice, as he placed his palm against her tear-stained skin, as he pressed a dainty tea cup into her shaking hand, as he reminded her that she is made of sterner stuff and yes, it is a shock, but how marvellous to find that I am alive and well – that warmth had seeped out of his voice, his eyes, his body language by the time we had climbed the seventeen steps to our flat. He isn’t cold, or unfriendly, he is just … gone.

 

Weeks have passed. John goes to work, meets mates for a pint, has a couple of dates. One of them even involves some snogging. That night it is clear from the set of his shoulders, from the clenched muscles of his jaw, that John has steeled himself for a dismissive comment, unkind and sharp, albeit accurate, and I am almost tempted to give him the satisfaction. I look at John and recognise the danger – he is on a hair trigger, spoiling for a fight – and he deserves it, more than anyone, John deserves the catharsis of fighting and shouting, blaming and accusing, repenting and forgiving.

 

I would willingly bleed and ache, if this could suffice as act of penance. It won’t do, though. It is not right, not right for John.

 

So I hold my tongue, offer to make tea, then withdraw to my room. Sitting on the edge of my bed, I listen to John pacing until dawn.

 

* * *

 

Mycroft is not interfering. I won’t ask for assistance anyway, but I must admit, at first, I am bemused by my brother’s obvious reluctance to incur John Watson’s wrath. When I interrogate him about their confrontation at his club, Mycroft blanches, sharp features somehow collapsing into an expression of discomfort too rare not to be savoured. Mycroft speaks of miscalculations and regret in clipped, rehearsed tones. I am not interested in punishing my brother, and yet, in this matter, absolution is not mine to dispense and comfort has never been within my gift. So, I continue not to ask for help, and Mycroft continues not to meddle. I don’t consider the dogged perseverance with paperwork to be worthy of my attention, and so the rent is paid, utility bills are settled, tedious matters relating to reinstalling me as one of the living are taken care of. Legwork can be Mycroft’s penance.

 

* * *

 

There were times when, holed up in a grim hotel room in some godforsaken part of the world, I desperately missed the work. Waiting, planning or healing, I yearned for the mundanity of a murdered civil servant and a missing file, the simple challenge of a forged painting, even the malodorous but dependable support of my homeless network. I felt able to admit to these yearnings superficially, but I refused to acknowledge their stratified nature. I dismissed as irrelevant the odd moments when the need to be in the kitchen at 221B Baker Street, nursing a cup of tea and grinning at John, was so overwhelming that I felt it like a raw, jagged-edged wound in my chest. As time passed and my absence stretched across one year, then two, these bright shards of pain eventually dulled and solidified, condensing to a permanent ache under my ribs, occasionally piercing my emotional armour with a starburst of loneliness and regret, which flared across my consciousness until I resolutely wrestled it back down.

 

Now, I feel packed in cotton wool. I am walking, talking, functioning, but I am barely alive. There is no satisfaction in identifying a fraudulent banker, no reward in humiliating a bumbling constable, and no fierce joy in _being right_. I spend more time than ever before with members of the homeless network. Some familiar faces have vanished; new, far too young and far too knowing faces have taken their places. I methodically track down two of the reliable old guard, observing them from a distance in their new lives, their new homes and their steady jobs. Three trails wind sorrowful paths around drugs, theft and prostitution, and one leads to a simple inscription at Norwood Cemetery.

 

* * *

 

Bin day.

 

She’ll be up in a minute, sweeping empty take-away cartons off the kitchen counters and into the large black bin bag.

 

“I’m not checking the fridge, boys. If there’s anything in there that needs to be chucked, you’ll have to do the honours.”

 

“Those slices of, what is that? Corpus callosum?  Well, they are beginning to reek, do you mind if I…?”

 

John never used to ask. Tolerant beyond measure, when body parts or experiments began to smell, they were unceremoniously dumped. This polite consideration feels wrong, stilted.

 

I turn to the fridge, drop three separate evidence bags containing human tissue into the yellow plastic bag marked for proper disposal at Bart’s, then ease the bag for general refuse from Mrs. Hudson’s grasp and tie it securely, before taking it downstairs and dropping it into one of the bins. I don’t need to be in the room to know about the wordless exchange between my landlady and my flatmate. She raises both eyebrows, John shrugs, the corner of his mouth tugging unhappily downwards. She pats his arm, and moves to put the kettle on.

 

* * *

 

“Quavers don’t actually qualify as a meal, you know?”

 

Molly doesn’t mind, not really. She’s pleased that I come to her, that I need her, even if I won’t talk about it, can’t bring myself to talk about it.

 

She has grown more confident, generally and specifically, as evidenced by the gentle teasing, which occasionally finds its way into her inane chatter. I let it flow over me, I welcome it, sometimes I actively seek it out – during the time that I spend in Molly’s undemanding company, I feel lighter and calmer than anywhere else.

 

John immediately forgave her. Of course he understood that she had no choice. Molly cried, John hugged her, tucking her slight frame against his jumper-clad chest, he stroked her back, soothed the sobbing girl and murmured his forgiveness against the centre parting of her hair. From across the room, my own gaze was held captive by the unflinching, thoughtful beam of John’s stare.

 

Now Molly is watching me over the rim of her coffee cup. I enjoy making her smile, bringing her a cup of coffee when I visit, white, no sugar. I brace myself for another random anecdote along the lines of “you look sad”, but what comes is so much worse in its brutal candour. “Why can’t you fix this? Why won’t you fix you and John?”

 

* * *

 

They are waiting for me to be last-minute brilliant, to weave a solution from thin air, perfect and icily beautiful, like a snow flake made of spun glass, like the Fibonacci sequence. No-one really believes that I cannot do this. That I simply lack the knowledge, the intuition, to return our relationship to that state of balance and harmony that I so desperately crave.

 

* * *

 

I find a measure of solace in my violin. Though it dissipates as soon as I slide the instrument from my shoulder, at least while I am playing, for a while, my body curled protectively around the melodies I coax from this dear old friend, my heart beats strongly, steadily in my chest, and does not feel squeezed as if held suspended in a vice. My breath flows smoothly, evenly, as my fingers fly and dance across the strings, and I play until my back aches, and the tips of my fingers smart and sting. And then I play on.

 

For anyone silently watching, my playing must seem unearthly tonight. Though I have been an accomplished musician for many years, now I pour my heart and soul into the melody, weave a story of fear and doubt, duty and courage, pain and loneliness. There are many acts of contrition, but none are as powerful or as genuine, as this. I play, and as I play, I strip away every layer of conscious thought, until there is nothing left of me but my music and my humanity.

 

* * *

 

There is a dull throbbing of tired muscles in by bowing arm. It hangs loosely beside my body. The fingertips of my left hand are tingling, and they gently hold the violin by its delicate neck. As I reluctantly emerge from the respite offered to me by music a susurration – gentle, regular breathing – not my own – intrudes upon my consciousness.

 

Ah, John has decided not to hold himself concealed this time.

 

I do not move, except to lift my eyes to the window, which reflects back to me John’s sombre gaze.

 

“I am …”, my voice breaks, and I draw a fortifying breath. “You must know … how sorry I am. There was no other way and I could not risk…”

 

Tears. Tears are coursing down my cheeks, and I wipe at them angrily, viciously with the back of the hand that is still holding the bow.

 

Another shuddering breath and I turn to face the man standing just inside the doorway.

 

“I found that there was nothing I wouldn’t do, to keep what I love safe. To keep _who_ I love safe.”

 

John’s lips do not curl into a smile. The corners of his eyes do not relax into their familiar pattern of crinkles. His gaze remains bright and steady, and his body stands straight and still. In the dim light bleeding into the room from the hallway behind John, I nevertheless observe two things. First, John’s jaw briefly tightens, as he presses his teeth together, hard. A tiny tell, so very John, so very dear – John has made a decision. And second. Oh, second – my heart stutters and contracts and _aches_ to witness this – the brightness in John’s eyes spills over and leaves liquid silvery trails on his skin.

 

* * *

 

The violin is placed gently in its case. Warm, strong fingers ease the bow from my tight grip, tug it out of my hand and clip it into its proper place inside the lid of the case. The same warm fingers reach up to smooth over the curve of my cheek, softly rubbing salty moisture into my cool skin. I lean into the touch and breathe.

 

* * *

 

I wake to the sound of Mrs. Hudson drawing the curtains open in the living room. I can imagine her glancing around the room, taking stock, and then she starts to collect the empty mugs scattered across mantelpiece and bookshelves. The sound her heels make is muffled when she crosses the rug, then bright and sharp as she moves through the kitchen. She runs the hot water, adds a splash of Fairy Liquid. I can hear her humming to herself, contentedly, and I picture her at the sink, a curl escaping to lie across her cheek and a soft smile playing around her mouth as she wipes, then rinses the last two mugs. The mugs that stood on the coffee table all night, right next to each other, their content cold and long-forgotten.

 


End file.
